Roof racks are well known and are manufactured in a variety of configurations. One conventional roof rack assembly includes first and second roof rails mounted in a spaced apart and substantially parallel arrangement on opposite sides of the roof of a vehicle. Often, such rails are attached to a vehicle roof during manufacture and assembly of the vehicle. One or more crossbars, usually two, typically extend substantially perpendicularly between the roof rails and attach to the roof rails.
According to conventional designs, crossbars are configured to be positioned perpendicular to the roof rails to which they connect. The brackets used to couple or attach the crossbars to roof rails provide for no flexibility or variation in this configuration. However, in practice, roof rails sometimes deviate from being parallel. This may be as a result of manufacturing imperfections or tolerances and/or any damage to the roof rails, such as through bending of the rails. These problems are exacerbated when crossbars are positioned at different points along the lengths of the roof rails, such as by moving the crossbars from one point along the length of the roof rail to another point by sliding the crossbars along the roof rails. Thus, although the ability to move the crossbars along the length of the roof rails provides improved flexibility for users, a crossbar of fixed length will not be able to attach to a point on a roof rail that is spaced too far apart from, or too close together to, the opposing roof rail.
Such requirements have previously restricted vehicle designers to arrangements in which the rails are substantially parallel, which may not always be desired, at least for aesthetic reasons.
Furthermore, conventional designs have been somewhat difficult to fit to a vehicle, and are sometimes not only time-consuming, but are also frustrating for users. This, is particularly the case where it is desired to install or remove crossbars for a roof rack on a regular basis. Generally, prior art arrangements require a first step of fixing a bracket to a roof rail and then a second step of fixing a crossbar to the bracket.